Dragging It Down
by chocolatecheesecakes
Summary: A series of unexplained Muggle deaths that all include a brick tied to a foot leads to an enchanted sheep, tattered robes and a screaming first-time mother. Yup. Just another day in the office for Harry Potter.


Hey!

This is for Care of Magical Creatures. I had to write about something or someone dragging someone down. As I was bored, I had a bit of a game and tried to see how many types of dragging down synonyms I could fit in to one story.

Also, I chose Empousai from the Greek Mythology Challenge on starts serious, and gets a bit weird. But anyway. I'm happy, because I wanted to honour my county, so I borrowed a sheep from one of our many fields to appear in this story.

Please enjoy!

oOo

Dragging It Down...

26th November 2001

Entry: Filed under 'Suicide', 'Murder' and 'Unknown'.

Cause of death: drowning. Suspected ulterior motives, traces of magical residue found on body. Discovered in the River Thames at 2:14pm on 26th November 2001.

Thirteen Muggles obliviated by Mr. Malcolm Higgs.

Other: brick found tied to body's leg. Identified as a Muggle, no other identity confirmed at time of filing.

Harry sighed, placing the slip of parchment neatly between 'D' and 'E', turning around and taking a huge gulp of coffee. Then he checked his watch.

He could make it in time for tea at the Weasley's, if he hurried.

So, with a final slurp of his drink, a half-hearted rustling of his documents, and finally a shove of his office chair, Harry grabbed his cloak and slammed the door behind him. The frame reverberated a little, wood against wood, and the lock clicked as Harry waved his wand at it distractedly.

It had been four years since Harry had become The-Boy-That-Died-Twice and life was looking rather good. Ginny and he would have been married two years that Saturday, and now he had a kid on the way. In about a month, to be perfectly exact (which, as an Auror, Harry liked to be). Although no Death Eaters had been seen in months, there was a group of Muggle-baiters that dragged the Wizarding World down.

The first incident had occurred last year. Harry had been woken up in the middle of the night by a Patronus call from the Minister of Magic - Kingsley Shacklebolt - and hurried out, kissing Ginny on the cheek as a goodbye before apparating to a Portkey station, as trans-Atlantic apparations were ill-advised.

Because a Muggle man had been drowned in the Hudson River, with a brick tied to his foot that had dragged him down to the riverbed.

Ever since that fateful day, life had never been quite the same. According to Kingsley the Muggle Prime Minister was incredibly reluctant to trust the Wizarding World, and Harry always kept tabs on his family despite the fact that they were one hundred percent Pureblood. Hermione lived in constant fear that the predator may turn to Muggle-borns.

But, although Harry never paused at work, although the world were shocked out of their skins, although the Muggles were being preyed upon, Harry still had a family to come home to in the evenings.

And in this case, also the weekly Weasley family dinner.

oOo

12th December 2002

Harry shook his head, passing Ron the parchment. "I really can't face another form." He explained, thumping his head on his desk a few times to release the pent-up frustration that had been lurking in his mind. "It's dragging my mood down mate."

"And your sex life." Ron laughed. He ignored both the glare and the hand gesture that was handed to him on a silver platter, and instead focused on enchanting another paper plane to fly around the office whilst he magically made the form fill itself in.

"Dunno why it's still going." Harry muttered, leaning backwards in his chair, hooking his hands behind his head and closing his eyes. "Thought they'd caught the guy ages ago."

In fact, that was true, as on the 1st of the month the ringleader had arrived at the Ministry, robes in tatters for some reason, and given himself up.

That wasn't the full story. The full story however was waiting in amongst the piles of papers on Ron's desk.

At that moment, a Patronus flew through the door. Harry immediately sat up straight, and Ron let the plane fly to the ground.

"Shit..." Harry echoed, as the Patronus assumed a corporal shape. "Shit shit shit shit shit!"

"HAROLD JAMES POTTER!" An angry voice screamed out of the horse's mouth. "GET YOUR GODDAMN ARSE OVER TO ST. MUNGO'S RIGHT NOW!"

There was a few moments of shocked silence. Then Ron blinked, straightened up and looked at his best friend. "You'd better go..." He trailed off.

"Yeah." Harry echoed, standing up, slightly in a daze. Then he seemed to shake himself awake, and he grabbed his cloak. "Er, Ron? Can you-"

Then he was gone.

It was for that reason that they didn't discover the real reason for the attacks until a few weeks later. There was one thing all the Muggles had in common.

They were all politicians.

And the man that turned himself in was the leader, but had in fact not counted on one of his underlings gaining a sense of humour and enchanting a nearby sheep to kill off the last one on their list.

Harry shook his head, and closed his eyes. "Kids." He murmured to himself. Of course, they had all been given periods of term in Azkaban, and the sheep had been returned to the sheep in Herefordshire where it came from. But he couldn't really fault the group too much, despite their murders.

Because the world was low enough without politicians dragging it down further down. Not that he would ever tell Hermione that, as she had dedicated her life to abolishing House Elf slavery and was, slightly amusingly, on the list for Minister for Magic candidates.

"Harry?" Ginny called. "James is dragging me down the stairs, can I have some help?"

Harry raced out of his study, only to see Ginny being tugged by their one-year-old son down the stairs.

And he laughed.


End file.
